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Why Use Technology in Schools and Higher Education?

Saturday, December 7, 2013

The world seems at an end without access to technology. Organizations in various cities and countries tend to increase their usage of technology to reinforce customer interaction, enhance brand value, and build up a strong business network. There is substantial evidence that a good number of schools and colleges in the U.S and in other countries worldwide are using technology to revive the teacher-student relationship.

The 2010-11 survey report released by the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth found "98 percent of higher ed institutions are on Facebook, and 84 percent are on Twitter".

Teachers find social media and mobile devices highly effective in fostering an improved learning atmosphere. They are playing a great role in engaging more students into active learning in classrooms whether live or virtual. Academic faculty is tapping into the raw potential of online social media platforms to teach various subjects and execute projects. For example, professors are using Smartphone's to teach geography, iPads to download an educational video from YouTube, and Foursquare to guide students around new college campuses.

Let's have a quick look at the positive effects of using technology in classrooms.

Learn Comfortably

Tech tools allow students to learn at their comfort. It means a student can learn at ease by setting up a convenient time to study and complete assignments at home.

Invite Guest Lecturers

Social media and high-end mobile applications allow teachers to invite guest lecturers from any part of the world to participate in an online discussion with the students. It helps the learners gain access to expertise in a specific topic or subject-matter.

Improves School Efficiency

Technology also helps the administrators to collate bulk data, easily and effortlessly to improve their decision-making process and rule implementation. They can capture and store data in their central database to view and share later with the senior authority.

High Engagement

Technology also engages students in learning - they can instantly seek clarifications by asking questions, collecting feedback from fellow classmates, and interacting with the teacher(s), 24x7. In a sense, online applications help a teacher improve class attendance, decrease drop-out rates, and thus increase ROI.

Improves Teaching Skills

Teachers can enhance their teaching skills and train themselves to manage classes better. Download multiple e-books and similar other reference materials from the internet to use in the development of finer classroom practices.

Meet the Needs of All Students

Today, students want virtual access to all course catalogs, class schedules, registration forms, and much more. Technology enables them to do all of that and more in a far simpler yet affordable way. School management can upload upcoming class schedules, class calendar, registration forms, examination timings, etc. on the school website to let people view and download the required documents, anytime and from anywhere across the world.